THE EXCHANGE RATES.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 4 December 1924, Page 8

THE EXCHANGE RATES.

AN OPTIMIST!V VIEW. BY Sill HAROLD BEAUCHAMP. Sir Harold Beauchamp, in an address to the Auckland Industrial Association on Tuesday, speaking on the exchange rates, said: ‘‘when wool was realising £8 6s 8d a bale, the bank rate of ex” change, the rate for buying London bills, was 12s 6d per cent., which was equivalent to Is 6d on each bale. Today the same class of wool is making not less than £4O a bale, and the buying rate for demand drafts on London is os per*cent., equal to 22s a bale. Thus, to-day the exchange rate charge is 20s 6d more per bale than formerly, but the farmer is getting the difference between £8 6s 8d and £4O or more. Which is better: Low prices for wool and low exchange, or high pi-ices and high exchange ?’» He estimated that the Dominion’s exports for the year would be about £58,000.000. and he imagined that imports would be in the vicinity of C10,000,G00. which would give a surplus of about £-13,000,(XX) of exports ovor imports. That ought to place the community in an exceedingly comfortable position from the financial standpoint. “It will, of course, increase the exchange difficulty,” lie said, “by piling up funds in London which to-day are costing the banks about £4 per cent, to transfer from that city to, say, Melbourne, which is recognised as the financial centre of Australasia.”